ambitionEvening, firedogs! I just flew in from Chicago, and boy are my tiny forelimbs tired.

I’m planning on posting a lengthier piece (or set of pieces) about my Kos experience later this week as a guest-blogger at Brilliant at Breakfast, but here are some quick takes:

Obviously, it was a major thrill to find myself at one point sitting between Digby and Glenn Greenwald, talking in real time. I’ve met blog-friends before in Connecticut last summer and DC during on election night, but this was a whole different deal. There was time to sit and talk and joke and compare notes. Greenwald is a delight in person, so sharp, so on point, and hilarious. The air around him seems to crackle and snap with wit, and while I expected to be really intimidated, I was immediately at ease in his presence.

Same goes for Digby, who I wanted to leap on and hug and squeeze and call her “George”, although by the time I joined her and Christy late Saturday afternoon for a chat in the hotel bar, both of them were looking kind of hugged out. Apparently a lot of people feel the same way I do about Digby, and for someone who has only recently shed their veil of anonymity on the web, I think the constant squeezing was starting to wear a little thin.

I had some real fun at Ari Melber’s panel with Mike Allen from the Politico, Jay Carney from Swampland, Jill from Feministe, and Glenn Greenwald. Oh, and the Sampland party was a great party, by the way.

If you’ve never been to a party before.

It was way, way, way too many people packed into a very small space. I’ve been to dorm-room beer and nitrous parties that were less uncomfortably crowded. The din was ear-splitting as people got liquored up and shouted to hear themselves.

Wonkette was there holding forth about something with a cocktail in hand, surrounded by an eager throng of men in suits. I thought about going over to her and saying hello, but I realized that she might tape it and publish the whole conversation on line and then I could end up seeing the whole thing re-enacted with some cokehead in a cheerleader outfit playing me. No, thanks.

I walked by Karen Tumulty just in time to hear her say, “Tumulty! No, Tu-MUL-ty!” which was handy right then because I couldn’t think of her name either. Joe Klein must have been a no-show because I never saw him, although he is very small, so he might have been under a napkin or stuffed into Ana Marie’s Kate Spade clutch.

I ate a few pieces of really bad sushi (Hey, I was hungry and who knew when the next opportunity to eat would be?), then went outside with Chicago Dyke to smoke a cigarette and drink a coca-cola. It was there that we realized that we’d rather repeatedly slam our fingers in a car door than go back into that maelstrom of noise and chaos. What would be the point?

I have to agree with Teddy about the convention center itself:

What did I like very little about YKos? — location, location, location. A venue with $4.50 pint bottles of water and three-dollar bananas; miles to walk between events on hard marble and concrete; with no commons to sit, meet, and chat except an outrageously priced restaurant and a bar; completely disconnected from the city where we’re located — well, it is entirely beyond me.

For people like our own Texas Betsy, who was alternating between crutches and a wheelchair, it was impractical at best, excruciating at worst. People were literally exhausted from all the walking and stair climbing.

The other thing was, as Jane pointed out earlier, the expense. I know that my budget for the rest of the month has taken a major hit. The whole thing would have been fine if I was some staffer from Newsweek or CNN who has a bottomless expense account, but I’m just a blogger from Georgia with a job in public radio. Nine bucks for a pack of smokes or twenty for a personal pizza is a bit beyond my means, which is why, unless some measure is taken to ensure that this doesn’t happen next year, Chicago will be both my first and last YearlyKos adventure.

It’s good to be home, and really good to “see” you guys. Did you miss me? I wish I’d gotten to spend some more time with readers. There were a bunch of people there I never even got to meet.

There’s much, much more to tell you, but this post has gotten long enough. I’ll let you know when my long piece goes up at Brilliant at Breakfast.